NGOs environmental legal mobilization and their access to the Spanish Supreme Court
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.35295/osls.iisl/0000-0000-0000-1061Keywords:
NGOs, environmental policy, Spanish Supreme Court, legal mobilizationAbstract
Environmental NGOs in Spain are well known policy actors. Since the nineties some of them have been invited to participate in governmental committees and/or to provide expertise to Parliamentary committees. They have also an important role in mobilizing public opinion to defend and protect the environment. We know less though about how do they intervene in the judicial arena. In the framework of a growing role of the Courts in the field of environmental governance, the goal of this paper is to analyze to what extent Spanish NGOs resorted to the judicial arena, specifically the Supreme Court, to enforce international and European higher standards of environmental protection and advocated against wrong or inadequate praxis in the implementation of environmental regulations. Several non-judicial factors seem to have strengthened that trend in Spain: increasing environmental national and European regulation as well as the NGOs organizational capacity to make judicial claims in line with their policy preferences.
Downloads
Metrics
Downloads:
PDF 436
References
Austen-Smith, D., and Wright, J.R., 1994. Counteractive Lobbying. American Journal of Political Science [online], 38(1), 25-44. Available from: https://doi.org/10.2307/2111334 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Baumgartner, F., and Mahoney, C., 2008. The two faces of framing: individual-level framing and collective issue definition in the European Union. European Union Politics [online], 9(3), 435-449. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1465116508093492 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Beyers, J., Rainer, E., and Maloney, W., 2008. Researching Interest groups politics in Europe and Elsewhere: Much We Study, Little We Know. West European Politics [online], 31(6), 1103-28. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1080/01402380802370443 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Bonine, J.E., 2009. Private Public Interest Environmental Law: History, Hard Work, and Hope. Pace Environmental Law Review [online], 26(2), 465. Available from: http://digitalcommons.pace.edu/pelr/vol26/iss2/8 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Börzel, T.A., 2006. Participation through Law Enforcement: The Case of the European Union. Comparative Political Studies [online], 39(1), 128-152. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0010414005283220 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Bouwen, P., and Mccown, M., 2007. Lobbying versus litigation: political and legal strategies of interest representation in the European Union. Journal of European Public Policy [online], 14(3), 422-443. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1080/13501760701243798 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Casademunt Montfort, A., 2016. Las plataformas en defensa del territorio como acción colectiva. In: J.M. Molins, L. Muñoz and I. Medina, eds., Los grupos de interés en España: La influencia de los lobbies en la política española. Madrid: Tecnos, pp. 474-494.
Chalmers, A.W., 2011. Interests, influence and information: Comparing the influence of interest groups in the European Union. Journal of European Integration [online], 33(4), 471-486. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1080/07036337.2011.579751 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Chaqués, L., and Muñoz, L., 2016. Explaining interest group participation in the parliamentary arena. West European Politics [online], 39(6), 1276-1298. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1080/01402382.2016.1184862 [Accessed 6 November 2018].
Chaqués, L., Palau, A., and Baumgartner, F.R., 2015. Agenda Dynamics in Spain. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Cichowski, R.A., 1998. Integrating the environment: the European Court and the construction of supranational policy. Journal of European Public Policy [online], 5(3), 387-405. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1080/135017698343884 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Cichowski, R.A., 2007. The European Court and Civil Society. Litigation, mobilization and governance. Cambridge University Press.
Cichowski, R.A., 2016. The European Court of Human Rights, Amicus Curiae, and Violence against Women. Law & Society Review [online], 50(4), 890-919. Available from: https://www.polisci.washington.edu/file/1158/download?token=pCHqiF2M [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Coglianese, C., 1996. Litigating within Relationships: Disputes and Disturbance in the Regulatory Process. Law & Society Review [online], 30(4), 735-766. Available from: https://doi.org/10.2307/3054116 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Cortner, R.C., 1968. Strategies and Tactics of Litigants in Constitutional Cases, Journal of Public Law, 17(2), 287-307.
De Figueiredo, J.M., 2002. Lobbying and Information in Politics. Business and Politics [online], 4(2), 125-129. Available from: https://doi.org/10.2202/1469-3569.1033 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
De Figueiredo, J.M., and De Figueiredo, R.J.P., 2002. The Allocation of Resources by Interest Groups: Lobbying, Litigation and Administrative Regulation. Business and Politics [online], 4(2), 161-181. Available from: https://doi.org/10.2202/1469-3569.1036 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Diani, M., 1995. Green networks: a structural analysis of the Italian environmental movement. Edinburgh University Press.
Epp, C.R., 1998. The Rights Revolution: Lawyers, Activists, and Supreme Courts in Comparative Perspective. University of Chicago Press.
Font, N., 1996. La Europeización de la Política Ambiental en España. Un Estudio de Implementación de la Directiva de Evaluación de Impacto Ambiental. Ph.D. dissertation, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona.
Galanter, M., 1974. Why the “Haves” Come out Ahead: Speculations on the Limits of Legal Change. Law & Society Review, 9(1), 95-160.
Giner, S., and Pérez Yruela, M., 1985. Corporatismo: el estado de la cuestión. Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas, 31, 9-45.
González Begega, S., and Luque Balbona, D., 2014. ¿Adiós al corporatismo competitivo en España? Pactos sociales y conflicto en la crisis económica. Revista Española de Investigaciones Sociológicas [online], 148, 79-102. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.5477/cis/reis.148.79 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Gunther, R., and Montero, J.R., 2009. The Politics of Spain. Cambridge University Press.
Hilson, C., 2002. New Social Movements: The Role of Legal Opportunity. Journal of European Public Policy [online], 9(2), 238-255. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1080/13501760110120246 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Hofmann, A., 2017. Lobbying and Interest Group Politics in the European Union. In: N. Zahariadis and L. Buonanno, eds., The Routledge Handbook of European Public Policy. Abingdon: Routledge.
Jiménez, M., 1999. Consolidation through institutionalisation? Dilemmas of the Spanish environmental movements in 1990s. Environmental Politics [online], 8(1), pp. 149–171. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1080/09644019908414442 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Jiménez, M., 2001. Sustainable development and the participation of environmental NGOs in Spanish environmental policy: the case of industrial waste policy. In: K. Eder and M. Kousis, eds., The Europeanization of Environmental Politics: Sustainable Development in Southern Europe. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic, pp. 225–253.
Jiménez, M., 2003. Spain: environmental protests in an emerging policy domain. In: C. Rootes, ed., Environmental Protest in Europe. Oxford University Press, pp. 166–199.
Jiménez, M., 2005. El Impacto político de los movimientos sociales. Un estudio de la protesta ambiental en España. Madrid: Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas / Siglo XXI.
Jiménez, M., 2007. The Environmental Movement in Spain: A Growing Force of Contention. South European Society & Politics [online], 12(3), 359–378. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1080/13608740701495244 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Jordan, G., and Maloney, W.A., 1997. The Protest Business? Mobilizing Campaign Groups. Manchester University Press.
Kelsen, H., 1967. Pure Theory of Law. Translation from the Second German Edition by Max Knight. Oakland, CA: University of California Press. (Originally published in 1934).
Kingdon, J., 1995. Agendas, Alternatives, and Public Policies. 2nd ed. New York: HarperCollins.
Lupia, A., and McCubbins, M.D., 1994. Designing Bureaucratic Regulation. Law and Contemporary Problems [online], 57(1), 91-126. Available from: https://scholarship.law.duke.edu/lcp/vol57/iss1/8 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
March, J., 2008. Explorations in Organizations. Redwood City, CA: Stanford University Press.
March, J., and Olsen, J.P., 1984. The new institutionalism: organizational factors in political life. The American Political Science Review [online], 8(3), 734-749. Available from: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1961840 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
McCarthy, J.D., and Wolfson, M., 1996. Resource Mobilization by Local Social Movement Organizations: The Role of Agency, Strategy and Structure. American Sociological Review [online], 61(6), 1070-1088. Available from: https://doi.org/10.2307/2096309 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
McCubbins, M.D., and Schwartz, T., 1984. Congressional Oversight Overlooked: Police Patrols v. Fire Alarms. American Journal of Political Science, 29, 721-749.
Medina, I., Molins, J., and Muñoz, L., 2016. Interest Groups in Spain: Still Fragmented, Politicized, and Opaque? [online]. Paper submitted to the ECPR General Conference, Prague. Available from: https://ecpr.eu/Filestore/PaperProposal/da5ecbcf-82d7-4fb5-b2d9-681f9a2dd220.pdf [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Ortega, J., 2011. ¿Quién ha apostado por la efectiva implantación del derecho de acceso a la justicia a favor de las organizaciones no gubernamentales en defensa del medio ambiente? Actualidad Jurídica Ambiental [online], 1-14. Available from: http://www.actualidadjuridicaambiental.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/2011_09_Julia_Ortega_Acceso-justicia-ONG.pdf [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Palau, A.M., and Chaqués, L., 2012. The Europeanization of law-making activity in Spain. In: S. Brouard, O. Costa and T. Köning, eds., The Europeanization of Domestic Legislatures: The Empirical Implications of the Delors' Myth in Nine Countries. New York: Springer, Studies in Public Choice Series, pp. 173-196.
Peñalver i Cabré, A., 2016. La defensa de los intereses colectivos en el contencioso-administrativo. Legitimación y limitaciones económicas. Pamplona: Thomson Aranzadi.
Schattschneider, E.E., 1960. The Semi-Sovereign People. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Scott, W.R., 2008. Institutions and Organizations: Ideas and Interests. London: Sage.
Soennecken, D., 2008. The growing influence of the courts over the fate of refugees. Review of European and Russian Affairs [online], 4(2), 10-43. Available from: https://doi.org/10.22215/rera.v4i2.199 [Accessed 31 October]
Thelen, K., and Steinmo, S., 1992. Historical Institutionalism in Comparative Politics. Cambridge University Press.
Truman, D., 1951. The Governmental Process: Political Interests and Public Opinion. New York: Alfred A Knopf.
Vanhala, L., 2011. Making rights a reality? Disability rights activists and legal mobilization. Cambridge University Press.
Vanhala, L., 2016. Legal Mobilization under Neo-corporatist Governance: Environmental NGOs before the Conseil d’Etat in France, 1975–2010. Journal of Law and Courts [online], 4(1), 103-130. Available from: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/684649 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Vanhala, L., 2018. Is Legal Mobilization for the Birds? Legal Opportunity Structures and Environmental Nongovernmental Organizations in the United Kingdom, France, Finland, and Italy. Comparative Political Studies [online], 51(3), 380–412. https://doi.org/10.1177/0010414017710257 [Accessed 6 November 2018].
Varillas, B., 1989. El papel de las organizaciones no gubernamentales en la conservación de la Naturaleza. In: Reflexiones sobre el Medio Ambiente. Madrid: Fundación Friedrich Ebert.
Wheeler, S., et al., 1987. Do the “Haves” Come Out Ahead? Winning and Losing in State Supreme Courts, 1870-1970. Law & Society Review [online], 21, 403-45. Available from: https://scholarship.law.berkeley.edu/facpubs/476/ [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Wilson, B., and Rodríguez-Cordero, J.C., 2006. Legal Opportunity Structures and Social Movements. The Effects of Institutional Change on Costa Rican Politics. Comparative Political Studies [online], 39(3), 325-351. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1177%2F0010414005281934 [Accessed 31 October 2018].
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2019 Luz Muñoz, David Moya
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
OSLS strictly respects intellectual property rights and it is our policy that the author retains copyright, and articles are made available under a Creative Commons licence. The Creative Commons Non-Commercial Attribution No-Derivatives licence is our default licence, further details available at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0 If this is not acceptable to you, please contact us.
The non-exclusive permission you grant to us includes the rights to disseminate the bibliographic details of the article, including the abstract supplied by you, and to authorise others, including bibliographic databases, indexing and contents alerting services, to copy and communicate these details.
For information on how to share and store your own article at each stage of production from submission to final publication, please read our Self-Archiving and Sharing policy.
The Copyright Notice showing the author and co-authors, and the Creative Commons license will be displayed on the article, and you must agree to this as part of the submission process. Please ensure that all co-authors are properly attributed and that they understand and accept these terms.